TT: The Orioles are a mediocre team

[sportsfan8703]

And while all that is great, we've had to give up multiple first round picks, terrible contracts and gut the farm system for that moderate bit of success.

Do you think it's worth it?

Do you think we are currently on the right track to success this year? What about long term success?

Be honest.

You want honesty. Play .500 baseball through June 20th and go on a run vs our weak schedule from June 21-July 31st. That puts us 10+ over at the trade deadline.

[SteveA]

And while all that is great, we've had to give up multiple first round picks, terrible contracts and gut the farm system for that moderate bit of success.

Do you think it's worth it?

Do you think we are currently on the right track to success this year? What about long term success?

Be honest.

I'm concerned that our farm system and player development system aren't great and that could cause problems in the future. Of course they weren't great in 2012 and they still haven't caused us a single losing season since then.

For this year, we have a great bullpen, very good defense, well above average offense, and poor starting pitching. Right now we are in position to make the playoffs. That makes me happy.

No, I haven't liked all the trades. You do deem to forget that while we have given up high picks, we did also gain one for Chen. And while we have given up guys such as Harder, we have also brought talent such as Gunkel into the organization. And people like to pretend we have done nothing in the international market, even though we have Schoop and Kim on the big league roster, and Miranda and Reyes in the minors. I know the accentuate the negative crowd tries to only point out one side of each of these factors and pretend the other side doesn't exist, just like they seem to want to pretend that the first 7 game's of the season don't count because it doesn't suit their narrative.

Well see about your "2% chance" the O's are over .500 on June 21. Or the other "prediction" in this thread that Buck won't be back next year because he will know he "can't win" and this team can't survive without a total teardown and rebuild.

The doom and gloom gets thick when things arent going well, that's for sure. It's almost like people forget how much of a marathon a 162 game season really is.

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[sportsfan8703]

I'm concerned that our farm system and player development system aren't great and that could cause problems in the future. Of course they weren't great in 2012 and they still haven't caused us a single losing season since then.

For this year, we have a great bullpen, very good defense, well above average offense, and poor starting pitching. Right now we are in position to make the playoffs. That makes me happy.

No, I haven't liked all the trades. You do deem to forget that while we have given up high picks, we did also gain one for Chen. And while we have given up guys such as Harder, we have also brought talent such as Gunkel into the organization. And people like to pretend we have done nothing in the international market, even though we have Schoop and Kim on the big league roster, and Miranda and Reyes in the minors. I know the accentuate the negative crowd tries to only point out one side of each of these factors and pretend the other side doesn't exist, just like they seem to want to pretend that the first 7 game's of the season don't count because it doesn't suit their narrative.

Well see about your "2% chance" the O's are over .500 on June 21. Or the other "prediction" in this thread that Buck won't be back next year because he will know he "can't win" and this team can't survive without a total teardown and rebuild.

The doom and gloom gets thick when things arent going well, that's for sure. It's almost like people forget how much of a marathon a 162 game season really is.

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People sad that we're playing .500 baseball over a stretch, like we didn't have 14 straight losing seasons or something. Tough crowd.

[LookitsPuck]

We do not have a well above average offense.

Current league average: 4.35 R/G. O's have averaged 4.4 (A tick above league average).

[Norfolk orioles]

You want honesty. Play .500 baseball through June 20th and go on a run vs our weak schedule from June 21-July 31st. That puts us 10+ over at the trade deadline.

I honestly don't see .500 baseball happening over the next 3 weeks against that schedule.

I just don't see it.

Hope you're right and I'm wrong.

[Norfolk orioles]

We do not have a well above average offense.

Current league average: 4.35 R/G. O's have averaged 4.4 (A tick above league average).

Also outside of Britton and oday, our pen has been pretty average.

Bundy hasn't been good, Matusz was let go, Worley is meh, oday has been a little shaky, givens is only good against righties.

Our pen is not nearly as good this year as its been in the past. Would love to see some stats on this.

[LookitsPuck]

Also outside of Britton and oday, our pen has been pretty average.

Bundy hasn't been good, Matusz was let go, Worley is meh, oday has been a little shaky, givens is only good against righties.

Our pen is not nearly as good this year as its been in the past. Would love to see some stats on this.

What about Brach? And Worley has been solid. Givens has been stellar against righties...needs to work on lefties (same as O'Day).

Brach: 425 ERA+, 1.00 ERA, 2.26 FIP, 0.963 WHIP

Worley: 209 ERA+, 2.03 ERA, 3.27 FIP, 1.258 WHIP

Givens: 182 ERA+, 2.35 ERA, 3.07 FIP, 1.565 WHIP*

[ArtVanDelay]

I'm concerned that our farm system and player development system aren't great and that could cause problems in the future. Of course they weren't great in 2012 and they still haven't caused us a single losing season since then.

For this year, we have a great bullpen, very good defense, well above average offense, and poor starting pitching. Right now we are in position to make the playoffs. That makes me happy.

No, I haven't liked all the trades. You do deem to forget that while we have given up high picks, we did also gain one for Chen. And while we have given up guys such as Harder, we have also brought talent such as Gunkel into the organization. And people like to pretend we have done nothing in the international market, even though we have Schoop and Kim on the big league roster, and Miranda and Reyes in the minors. I know the accentuate the negative crowd tries to only point out one side of each of these factors and pretend the other side doesn't exist, just like they seem to want to pretend that the first 7 game's of the season don't count because it doesn't suit their narrative.

Well see about your "2% chance" the O's are over .500 on June 21. Or the other "prediction" in this thread that Buck won't be back next year because he will know he "can't win" and this team can't survive without a total teardown and rebuild.

The doom and gloom gets thick when things arent going well, that's for sure. It's almost like people forget how much of a marathon a 162 game season really is.

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Fangraphs does not think our defense is very good. But as I said in another thread, it's too soon to draw conclusions from that.

http://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=all&stats=fld&lg=all&qual=0&type=1&season=2016&month=0&season1=2016&ind=0&team=0,ts&rost=0&age=0&filter=&players=0

Also, Hader looks like a potential ace while Gunkel looks like a fringe major leaguer. Gaining Gunkel doesn't make me feel better about losing Hader.

[25 Nuggets]

You want honesty. Play .500 baseball through June 20th and go on a run vs our weak schedule from June 21-July 31st. That puts us 10+ over at the trade deadline.

Seriously, it's like people don't understand you can play mediocre baseball for the majority of the season and still make the playoffs in the AL.

Let's take a look right now. Boston takes the AL East, ok. Chicago takes -- no wait, they just nose-dived. Somebody takes the AL Central. Seattle or Texas takes the AL West or maybe the Astros turn it around. And there's two wild cards on top of that.

Things are much more settled in the NL where you got the haves and have-nots. Not the case in the AL.

[wildcard]

Five of the O's 12 pitchers have less than one year of experience in the majors. That's 42%. Kind of a challenge for a contending team.

As you can imagine some are doing well and some aren't. Wilson pitched at least 6 innings in all 5 of his May starts and has become the O's 3rd best starter. Givens in spite of his problems with lefties gets rightes out really well. Bundy and Wright have talent but are struggling. Tolliver just arrived.

There is some pitching depth with McFarland and Drake who are both ready if called on.

The O's scored the fewest runs per game of any team in the AL in May. 4.07 runs per game. There is really no excuse for the this. They are a veteran group with talent. Every team in the AL should not be outscoring them. I doubt that continues for the rest of the season.

I have not given up on Gallardo. I think he may be better than Jimenez or Wright. The team does play better with Hardy. He will be back before long.

I still have hope for this team as a contender. Boston looks better though.

[Aristotelian]

I agree with everything OP said. The pitching seems to be showing its true colors. We don't have a single dominant pitcher. We have two guys capable of consistent quality starts (Tillman and Wilson), two guys with great stuff but inconsistent (Gausman, Wright), and two overpaid disasters (Gallardo, Ubaldo). (Hopefully at least Gallardo can get on track).

DD made a couple of nice moves, solidifying DH with Trumbo at little cost, and grabbing Rickard from Rule 5 to replace Lough. But the big moves have killed us. No pitching depth in the minors. $150M committed to Chris Davis for the forseeable future. Lost draft picks to acquire Ubaldo and Gallardo and retain Davis. If we don't contend now, the future doesn't look good either.

Still, keep in mind, here were the standings as of June 1, 2014.

TOR 34 24 .586 -- 291 252 .565

NYY 29 26 .527 3.5 230 245 .471

BAL 28 27 .509 4.5 234 240 .488

BOS 27 29 .482 6.0 231 237 .488

TBR 23 34 .404 10.5 217 255 .427

They looked pretty much the same as of June 20, when Britton blew a save on a crushing Carlos Beltran HR for the division rival Yankees. The point being, there is time to get hot again and realize this team's potential. I can see this team finishing in 4th, but I can also see us running away with the division if things break our way.

[webbrick2010]

I love these threads after a loss or a bad stretch. Like clockwork.

Make sure to bump this when they run off 8/10 and get back to 10 games above .500.

Oh I forgot, no chance of that happening this team is destined for failure. Just a mirage.

Then you should be very happy for the rest of the season

[Camden_yardbird]

I would expect doom and gloom right now, and while I think some really stupid moves were made (not starting to rebuild last year, signing Gallardo after missing out on Happ, Hill or Latos, etc) I don't think this is a mediocre team. I think this team finishes somewhere around 87 wins. That said, I don't think that gets them into the playoffs and I really hope that the evaluation of this year's chances is done better than last year. Dan has kind of sent the team down the rabbit hole by bidding against himself and resigning Davis. But barring a Howardesque collapse, that should stop them from trading him if things go south.

My real disappointment the is with Jones. He works really hard and advocated to retain a competitive team around him, but it's really clear to me that he has been quite injured for the last year and that his shoulder is not right. At least I hope it's his shoulder because otherwise his regression has been quite alarming.

[Frobby]

J

Premise of the thread:

The 2016 MLB team in Baltimore is mediocre

Arguments that shouldn't be offered in support:

- The MiL system has been gutted

- The long term contracts will eventually kill the team

- Players we've traded are good / better than what we've got

There are good reasons why this Orioles team in 2016 may be mediocre, but the points above have nothing to do with it.

Tonight's loss was disappointing for a lot of reasons. I'm bummed. I think there is a pretty good chance that the 2016 will turn out to be mediocre (if that is defined as 78-84 wins).

Reasons for disappointment and/or concern with the 2016 team:

1) AJ - This is by far the biggest reason. He just doesn't look like the same hitter to me over the last 1.25 seasons. I feel like he isn't aging well and I don't like the way I see his body composition changing. This isn't really anyone's "fault" per se but the Orioles won't be a strong offensive team if a cog this major plays like a slightly below average to well below average offensive player. I hope this isn't as bad as I fear it is.

2) Ubaldo - He looks awful. Beyond his command which is always erratic at best, I don't see the same quality of stuff this year. I am quite concerned. DD certainly owns this signing. I'd give him another couple starts and do something else if things don't change.

3) Gausman - While the results haven't been that bad, the results are much worse than his talent level. There were times tonight when he was simply overpowering and looked like an ace, but he also had times when I wondered what was going on upstairs. He is becoming like Jeremy Guthrie used to be for me where I marvel at his stuff, but wonder how he is going to take a winnable game and lose it. He had better stuff than Rodriguez tonight and it wasn't very close, but he gave the game away in the first two innings. Good for him that he got his stuff together and finished strong, but it is time for those "moral" victories to end and the real victories to begin. He is no longer a young pitcher. Figure it the freak out.

4) Matusz - Not much to say here. He should have been an important left handed cog in the pen and instead was incredibly bad. He is gone quickly so it is over, but the bullpen as constructed couldn't really afford for him to not show up. We have some redundancy on the RHP side, but had basically none on the LHP side since Britton is strictly a closer.

Really, there isn't a helluva lot going super wrong which makes sense since I think most people would sign in blood if offered the option to be 6 games above 500 on June 1st. The good news is I don't see a lot of overperforming either at this moment. I think Manny is just this damn good. There are a few marginal overperformers but nothing huge.

I will finish by writing that the Sox are really good (as some of us predicted before the season), but they are also really hot right now. We are clearly cold right now. I expected a bad series. When a hot, good team faces any cold team, it has the chance to be ugly. I wouldn't draw too many conclusions based on this series other than the Sox are better than we are which I would think was already pretty obvious just looking at the rosters. I don't find it super depressing as I think the Sox are the best team in the AL. I'd put the Orioles in the mix with a group of other teams just behind the Sox.

I expect the season to be entertaining and the Orioles to be in it September. I am intrigued to see it play out and isn't that really the point? Interest level?

Anyway, my 2 cents...

Best post of the thread. I have some confidence that Jones will heat up and bounce back, but if he doesn't, that's a huge blow to our chances. And Ubaldo has to either improve or be replaced. Not sure who would replace him -- hopefully Gallardo finds something he didn't show in spring training or the early part of the season. In any event, we're contenders until we aren't, and I don't interpret one cold-hitting 2-7 stretch as a harbinger of certain doom. I have some concerns but I'm not panicked.

[accinfo]

Mediocre is kind

I had them as 70-92 pre-season, and maybe their hot start will keep them from 92 losses but it will

still be close.

We all know you are hoping for 92 or more losses. You would rather be right about something then actually root for your team.